Small things of habit and comfort

I am a creature of (crazy?) (insane?) habit.  As I’m trying to pay attention, I am noticing these things.  Things like:

…carrying the 300 page manuscript around even though I know I won’t be able to work on it;

…always parking in the same parking spot.  (Sometimes I do change it, but even when I do change, I seem to make sure it is the furthest one in the row…preferably next to a curb);

 …driving with the window down and the heater on full;

…waiting to the last minute to turn things in or buy presents for people, even when I know the deadline is coming up.

My cat is a creature of habit as well.  She stands outside the bathroom when I take a shower and when I open the door she meows at me.  Then she turns around and stretches, waiting for me to pull her tail.  After I do this, she goes to her scratching post and scratches it before sitting down to watch me running around like a crazy person trying to find things that I can’t find because it’s not like I didn’t know that the morning was coming or anything.

The last two mornings someone has parked in my spot.  We now have to park (because of construction) in what some call the lower forty and some call New Mexico.  It’s not so bad except it’s up hill at the end of the day and it’s about three times as far as I used to have to park.  I have claimed my spot with the oil stain drip mark my car leaves, so I thought people would leave it alone.  But as we all have to fight for a space now or park even further away and take the shuttle, I guess I should have put a sign up…’UNDEAD ONLY’ or something…’BACK OFF, THIS IS MY SPOT AND I DON’T LIKE CHANGE’…’DRIVER SLIGHTLY CRAZY AND CAN’T REMEMBER FROM DAY TO DAY WHERE SHE PARKS HER CAR, SO CONSISTENCY IS BETTER’?   

This morning the same someone was in my spot before me.  They had parked over the line, taking up two spaces so I couldn’t even park next to it, which was very rude.  Got me to thinking again how the smallest, thoughtless act…the insane habit stuff that you don’t think about…can effect others around you.  The acts that I derive unconscious comfort from, could be driving someone else up the wall.  The acts I don’t think about, could be upsetting someone else’s unconscious comfort…maybe I didn’t see the sign that said ‘THIS PARKING SPOT IN THE LOWER FORTY IS FOR THE LITTLE GOLD PICK-UP…DRIVER IN A HURRY, COS THEY DO REALLY IMPORTANT BIG THINGS ALL DAY AND CAN’T BE BOTHERED ABOUT THE SMALL THINGS.’

…Maybe…

All I do are small things, but when you can’t make the big things change, the small things count. 

I was pleased to see there was a notice on the windshield of the little gold pick-up for being inconsiderate and parking in two places…kinda went out of my way to see it and giggle a bit.  Then I carried in my 300 page manuscript the ¼ mile to work, not because I will be able to work on it, but because I found I couldn’t leave it in the car.

Small things can be a world of comfort.

Like the way my cat shouts at me, meowing a little cat cry like she is sooooo hungry when I haven’t feed her yet.  Then, when I do feed her, she pauses and lifts her head to let me pet her before she eats… 

Small things can make a world of diference.

xb.

When the 5 year old makes up the rules there are dinosaurs and teleportation special skills

This is what happens when the 5 year old makes up the rules.

‘You can’t have purple trees!  There are no purple trees,’ the 9 year old argues from the back seat.

‘Yes, you can, this is my game and there are purple trees!’ the 6 year old replies.

I was asked to referee…I don’t think the 9 year old was too happy.  In my world, there can be purple trees.  I like it that way.

I may have said before, but I’m not sure that I have so I will say again, we like to play board games.  We don’t play Monopoly or Risk and I only got Uno for the 5 year old when he turned 6 because he said it was ‘what I always wanted!’  No, most of those games are too urbane for our little family.  We play games involving stacks and stacks of cards and tokens in buckets and often little figures we move around the table that is just not quite big enough.

Until fairly recently, I have allowed everyone else (even the 6 year old) to tell me the rules, because I didn’t quite get the mechanism behind them.  I’m used to card games and I play a killer gin, but save modifiers and converting the odds in the remaining dice to the probability of completing a task are kind of new to me.  I have a hard enough time trying to figure out the rules behind polite company in every day life, let alone those set in another universe.

A while back, when the 6 year old was still 5, he set up a game for us to play on the living room floor.  He made up the rules, as he likes to do and I played along.  After a while I had to write down what he said because he is in the same breath the most simple and complex human being and it boggles my mind.  I’m wondering if somewhere in here I will start to understand the spirit of playing, despite not understanding all the rules?

Quotes from the game:

‘Kaboosha…it is disabled!’

– As my tank blows up…a lot of my tanks blew up.

‘You might get snake eyes…you-might-get-snake-eyes.’

– I think this was supposed to be a good thing.

‘Well, in my game, tanks fire missiles.’

– After being told by his big brother that tanks do not fire air to air missiles.

‘If you want to get snake eyes you have to get double six. … oooh, so close.  Crippled…actually, dismobilized.  You were so close!’

– I think this (again) was supposed to be a good thing.  I didn’t have the heart to tell him that double six is not ‘snake eyes’.  I am not sure that I want that phone call from the teacher.

‘It flies into little tiny peaches.’

– Tee Hee!

‘There’s a lot of things I want to be when I grow up…an artist…actually, there’s only two.  An artist and a board game maker.’

– He’s got high ambition.

‘Pretty intense, isn’t it?’

– His actual words. 

‘Mom, pause game.  You can definitely do what you need to do now.’

– I’m not sure that I asked him to stop the game because I had to do something.  I am always doing that though…maybe he just knew.

‘What?  She puts her blowey-up things next to her soldiers!’

– The rules being a mystery to me, I guess this was a faux pas?

‘You don’t use cats!…and plus there is no cats in warriors.’

– I tried to use the cat as a weapon of mass destruction.  Apparently this was against regulations.

‘Add him to your experience pile.’

– A pile of toy soldiers that could be resurrected if necessary…they were placed right next to the pile of dinosaurs that would be used in the ‘next phase’.

And perhaps my favorite:

Me – ‘I don’t understand.’

– I really didn’t.  My head hurt and I wanted to praise his creativeness and inguinity, but there was dinner to make.

The small one’s answer and the point of this post? –  

‘I know!  Good game, isn’t it?!’

xb.

Maybe I need a towel with a duck hood

‘Ducky isn’t hilarious any more.  Remember he hit his head on the book shelf?’ – Quote from the almost 6yo.

Hilarious Ducky used to be hilarious.  It was a snowy night about three years ago and the draft blew inside the glorified tent we used to call the apartment.  The small child had just taken a bath with his brother, floating fish, sinking army vehicles and expired syringes (without needles and never used).  He put on the yellow towel with the hood that looks like a duck.  He was now Hilarious Ducky, a super-hero for the modern age.

It was then that tragedy happened.  After running into the front room and running back, after running into the kitchen and his room without anything on but his clever disguise, after his mother shouted at him for the fifteenth time to come get dressed…he hit his head on the book shelf.

He wasn’t hilarious any more.

Tragic.

What I don’t understand is how the almost 6 year old remembers the incident.  I don’t have any idea as I didn’t see the crash…I didn’t even hear it…but it must have  been profound for him.  He remembers the book shelf exactly, he pointed out where Hilarious Ducky had hit his head so many years ago and ended his hilariousness.

He did this as he asked me, ‘Why did you put Ducky away?  I can’ t believe you put Ducky away.  Can we not put Ducky away again?’

He then busied himself running in circles with the towel flapping behind him.  He says, ‘Mom, I’m a cannon ball, watch me.’ And propels himself into the air, pulling his knees to his chest and wrapping the towel around himself.  I watch him fall to the carpet without catching his fall.

I watch him come up laughing.

Nevermind, the bookshelf that ended the hilarious part is now right at the end of his runway and his uncontrolled descent. Nevermind, his mother’s heart stops every time he lands with a thud.

‘Mum,’ he says, ‘do you know why the cannon ball is yellow?  Cos fire is yellow…or some of it.’

Well, it is, I guess, even though I’ve never seen a yellow cannon ball.

The other day, I gave a kinda new friend of mine a copy of the title sequence of the screenplay to read.  I did this without explanation or cover art, so she had no idea what it was.

She was confused.

I’m actually ok with that.  I’m over trying to speak the ‘correct’ language or put things in the ‘correct’ format.  I figure that if it’s new and exciting…it’ll be new and exciting or totally misunderstood, either way I’m vindicated.  If I (ever) throw it up into the air and it falls like the Not-Hilarious Ducky cannon ball on yellow fire…well, I’m working up to being ok with that.  If I only ever get a limited audience who sees a reflection of themselves in it…well, I need to finish it first before I think about all that, but it sounds like a good result.

Every question that I get about the monster (i.e. the screenplay) gives me another bit of detail that I can put in.  I try not to get upset when I’m asked questions that have already been explained…if I had to explain every bit of blue eye shadow it would make the silly thing even longer than it is already.  I recognize that it is a completely obscure jumble of words and images, but I have to assume some level of intelligence in the reader.  The absence of something is often as significant as the presence, but not everyone will recognize that something is missing.  I know the monster is not for everyone though.  I get that.

So, I gave the copy to the new friend and after I explained that I am not in danger of jumping off anything significantly high, she asked me if I wrote a lot.

‘No…not really,’ I reply, embarrassed.

I mean, I don’t.  I don’t have a portfolio of (finished) stories, I don’t have novels I’m trying to sell (yet).

So, I don’t write, right?

Well, I do.  I just don’t usually let anyone read what I write.

Ducky continues to be hilarious, even though he doesn’t call himself Hilarious Ducky.  He was in very dangerous danger of becoming even less hilarious by hitting his head on the bookshelf again the other day.  The boy inside the disguise was and is still the most beautiful intelligent, sensitive, creative if a little unbalanced child.

I would like to stop vacillating between apprehension and courage.  I would like to stop equivocating because I fear that someone might get to know me and not like it.  …there are too many lessons to be learned and learned well.  There needs to be more time during the day and I don’t know, maybe I need a towel with a duck hood?

The 5 year old drew this picture to illustrate how to create Lego battleships:

He drew this:

and well, I knew what it was instantly and was impressed.  It may just be because I am his mother, but my husband said that it looks like the almost 6 year old has inherited my talent for drawing…

I wanted to fight and remind him that I haven’t drawn in a really, really long time…but what is is, right?  Accept the complement.  (I think it was a complement).  Just because I don’t call the Duck hilarious (I’m not allowed to), doesn’t mean he doesn’t make my day better.

Ok, I’m finished rambling.

I think my cat just ate a piece of wadded up tape.

Oh, and now she’s come to stick her claws into my thighs.

Joy.

xb.

I can’t believe you like caterpillars in my food and other corn

The cat has been following me around relentlessly the last few days. I am not sure if it is because it is so cold or if I am leaking some sort of sad pheromone that makes her want to take care of me. Maybe she was scared by the Buzz Lightyear balloon that the 9 year old got for his birthday. When you tap it, it says things like:

‘To infinity and beyond!’

and

‘I’ve got a galaxy to save!’.

Two nights after we brought it home, something set it off at three in the morning and scared the life out of me. I figured if it was a burglar and he wanted to save the galaxy, things were somehow going to be ok, but it took me forever to fall back to sleep. The balloon has been floating lower and lower and after I found it hovering about head height on the stairs last night like some large headed specter, I gave up on it and threw it in the trash outside.

Because it is somehow really beginning to feel like winter (even though it is back up to 70F), we made Scouse this weekend. I feel like I don’t actually have the right to explain what Scouse is in the same way that I would be pretty upset if someone gave away the secret of my family’s Momice rolls. (Which incidentally, I have not actually figured out yet…apparently that DNA skipped me, but you get what I mean.)

To say that Scouse is a root vegetable stew doesn’t do it justice either. That is like saying my shiny new phone is a device for communication or that Maserati make vehicles for getting around. Scouse usually contains lamb or stewing steak but there is also a veggie version. I know that you can do a veggie version of almost anything but this meatless version is not called veggie or vegan or meatless or mock or any of those other detonations that people tend to use. Scouse without meat it is called Blind Scouse.

I love the way the British have with words.

It is kind of an honor to be carrying on a family recipe, even if I am rather nervous about my ability as a cook…and even if it is almost impossible to mess up a batch of Scouse (I have been told…I don’t know, I am sure I could manage it) it is an honor to be told that it is a good batch.

The 5 year old went to the farm with his class last week. He was so proud that he brought home bags full of produce he came running up to me when I got in the door to tell me all about it. I wasn’t sure if he was just reveling in the experience of digging in the dirt for food or if I have said too many times that I work because we need food to eat and he was proud to have brought food home for us.

Either way, I felt slightly sad and proud at the same time. It did feel kind of strange to be eating food that was basically put on the table by my child, but I got over it. I think that the Scouse this weekend tasted particularly good because it was straight from the ground and into our bowls, because the 5 year old picked it and helped prepare it and because he was so proud.

We left the corn that he had picked in the refrigerator, still wrapped up in husk. I am not a big fan of corn. I don’t mind if it is from a tin and all nice and de-cobbed…that makes me a deviant, doesn’t it? Anyway, we left it in the fridge and just last night I asked the 5 year old to peel it or skin it or…de-husk (?) it. He was very excited, but as I expected, we found this:

I took a picture of it cos it was cool, and because that is what I do and the 5 year old says,

‘I can’t believe you like caterpillars in my food!’

After taking the picture, I ‘rescued’ it by putting it outside…I realize that it is now winter and I realize that I put it in a pile of rocks that are not likely to sustain it…but what are you going to do? It was better than putting it in the trash or in a jar.

The 5 year old said, ‘Olivia put a bunch of bugs in a jar once and put the lid on tight.’

‘Oh?’ I asked.  (Sometimes this is all you can say to him.)

‘Yeah,’ he says, ‘they all died.’

And I’m thinking, OK, not going to put it in a jar.

The second cob was just as bad, and this one had a tiny little caterpillar in it. It was so small, I kept losing sight of it in the corn silk and kernels   I tried to rescue it, but it fell in the trash filled with corn silk and husk and coffee grinds and the 9 year old’s old shoes with the holes in and whatever else was in there.

What does the five year old comment?

‘Now the caterpillar’s going to live under a world of trash…Not a long life for him.’

So even though my heart said that I needed to dig through the mountain of trash to rescue the small creature, I realized the hopelessness of the task, I distracted the boy and tied the bag loosely. Our rubbish bin sits right inside the door that leads to the garage and I quickly carried the bag out of the kitchen and whisked it through to the rubbish bin. I hoped that the 5 year old wouldn’t tell me what a horrible human being I was (any more than he already had). I hoped that I could get away without incident. I shoved the loosely tied bag into the bin and what do I hear?

‘To infinity and beyond!’

I want to believe that this was not a call to my conscience, though perhaps the 2mm bug is a really brave 2mm bug.

Who knows?

He sounded braver than I am.

x.

The ACCUPLACER…

I’ve been talking about going back to school for a long time.  It sounds like such a good idea until you think about the reality of it.  Like wiggling your toes underneath the duvet while your cat sits on the end of the bed, it is all very well and good until the nice kitty sinks her claws into your flesh.  (Don’t worry.  I have not yet begun to think about the reality of going back to school.  Currently, I am still in the flying off the edge of the cliff stage.)

So, despite the fact that I have a degree and could have opted out of taking the ACCUPLACER, I have an overwhelming feeling that I should start at the beginning.  There are several reasons for this:  I don’t believe I am actually ready for school, I think that I tend to jump in feet first and then realize that I am an idiot, I think that I don’t know much of anything, and I am afraid of failing at something that I have been talking about doing for a long time.

The ACCUPLACER (their capital expression, not mine) is a placement test to assess a new student’s readiness for college courses.  I took the ACT/SAT tests some time ago…aach, eighteen years?…and apparently the test scores only reflect knowledge for five.  I don’t remember what I got on either the ACT or SAT, I know I didn’t do too badly but most of my friends got higher scores.  Regardless, before I could continue with my registration, I needed to take the test so they could figure out where I am on some sort of measurable scale.  (Apparently, saying that I know some English and math stuff, isn’t the conformation they are looking for.)

There are four segments to the ACCUPLACER.  (I feel like I should add a slight echo effect to the word.)  Two assess English: reading comprehension and sentence structure.  Two assess math: arithmetic and basic algebra.  I can’t quite figure out how algebra will be necessary for nursing, but jerry-rigging a heat pad with chux, a damp towel and packing tape comes in handy on occasion, so why not algebra?

In my mild panic to be prepared, I printed everything off the college website about the test including an example quiz.  It took me about an hour to complete the whole thing.  My notes in the margins, the a=13, so x=4a(13-a)…looked like attempts at formulating alchemy.  After I got two questions into the CLA (College Level Algebra?), I gave it up for a lost cause.  In the end, of the 42 questions I answered, I got 32 correct.

I figured that was a result…life is good.  I printed off copies for everyone in the office who wanted one.  (Not with my answers on, but a blank test so they could take it too.)  Everyone said I would do well…just fine.  But I didn’t believe them.  (Perhaps they don’t understand the mess of the English language I make.)…(Perhaps they don’t understand that if it gets above 5, multiplication isn’t the 8×7=easy, I memorized this when I was nine, for me.  It is more of the 2(7×4)…or sometimes I work it out as (7×2)+(7×2)+(7×2)+(7×2)=hang-on, let me figure that out.

On Friday, I had a complete mental breakdown.  I wonder what it would be like to get through the week without one.  This time it was that on top of a difficult week with work and emotion (I want to go into this but I will not because I might well up again), the office grinding to a halt because the fax machine and internet were down, and a misunderstanding about what someone might have said…I was not as effective as I might have been.  In fact, I was ready to curl up into a little ball and sleep for several centuries.  If I’d known the address to the little shack in the woods, I would have stormed in and demanded a poisoned apple.

But what do you do?  Life goes on.  I probably would have gotten lost on the way to the witch’s place anyway.

So, I will try to get to the point, I swear…my ACCUPLACER story:

I went over to my parent’s house after work to avoid the morning rush of having to get the boys ready.  It was an absolute treat to be able to relax and focus on the tasks I needed to do…not the dishes or the brushing of teeth.  I got to read my great-grandmother’s account of her life, I got to play with the boys and I got to stop long enough to notice the beauty in light, shadow and reflection that infuses my mother’s house.  I got to eat good food and sleep very well.

In the morning my alarm didn’t go off…not because it didn’t go off or was broken, but because I had set it for an hour after I should have.  Mum, gratefully, woke me up in time.  I didn’t want to leave the heavy comfort of the duvet or the refreshing breeze from the crack in the window.  And despite having slept for nine hours and not having had anything to drink for more five days (yeah me!), I woke up feeling like I had a hangover.

When I finally got out the door, I was late.  On the way there, I listened to NPR in an effort to make myself smarter, but after about five minutes of a segment on Biernstein, I decided mindless music suited me better.  Don’t mean to put a downer out there, but I don’t think you can get smarter in five minutes.  I really wish at that point I had actually read all of the things I printed off about the ACCUPLACER, instead of loosing them in a pile of papers somewhere in my Mary Poppins bag.

When I finally got there and finished wondering why I had wanted juice and coffee when I had to sit for an extended period of time in a chair trying to be smart, I was a combination of petrified and numb.  Inside the code-padlocked door, were environmentally controlled booths with glass walls and doors that slid shut with a ‘woosh’.

I tried to be friendly, but it was a bit like making jokes to TSA agents or police officers…maybe they were just bewildered by my nervous idiotic chatter.  I put everything in a locker (number 11) as I was instructed and felt naked and unprepared.

Despite hearing the directions and knowing where I needed to go…booth 6…I still struggled with self doubt.  Were they watching me, had I followed directions correctly?  Was I being graded on my ability to work out the complex problem of getting to my desk without tripping over my feet?

They very kindly provided earplugs, which I tried and didn’t like.  I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to use them or if they were optional.  I could still hear the air conditioning and the chaos in my mind panicked a little…maybe because it could no longer escape.  So I took them out and put them with the wad of tissue paper that I had used to (discretely?) wipe the sweat from under my arms.

The first section was fairly straight forward…my name and address I got correct.  (At least I’m pretty sure I got them correct.)

The second section, I read everything twice, just to make sure that I got it right.

The third…I still read everything as I was still afraid, but it went a lot quicker.

The fourth, I expected to be arithmetic, which I am not very good at but it skipped to the final section, algebra.

Now, I remember sitting in math class as a child.  I remember fairly distinctly all of my high school math classes.  I actually kind of like math (not arithmetic, but math with letters and shapes) because it has definite answers and each equation is a mini puzzle to sort out.  (I only don’t like arithmetic because I am not very good at it…doesn’t seem worth the challenge when there is a calculator handy.)

The first question was something along the lines of:

‘What is not a factor of 42a²-36a-6?’  (Note: this is not an actual question and I am not sure that I have done the math right in figuring out an example of what I remember the type of question to be.)

…yeah.

I panicked when there was an hour to go before the testing center closed and then it was over.  Last question, please print your scores…

I have to admit that I was a little sad that I was finished.  I wanted more little sentences with numbers and letters and superscript to figure out.  But it was over and apparently I passed.  It kind of kills me that I don’t know what answers I got incorrect.  I will, of course, never know…so I have to let it go.  But it is still irritating.  I will say that it did seem pretty obvious when I had no idea what the answer was and probably got a question wrong, because the next one was super easy.

All of this said, I would like to offer my unofficial advice for ACCUPLACER takers:

1. Print off the practice quiz.  Take it in your own time and then either recycle or turn the 14 pages into paper art.
2. Read the directions.  Then read each question carefully…try also not to say, ‘oh, yeah’ out loud when you catch yourself before you make a mistake.
3. Have your mum make you a baked potato with curried lentils and tomato slices the night before.  It is good.
4. Try to remember that you are not interviewing for the CIA.
5. Try also to remember you are going back to school to learn.  If you don’t know it already, the ACCUPLACER will tell by its voodoo magic which courses you need to take to get up to speed.  You won’t get buzzed with an electric shock every time you get an answer wrong.
6. Wear effective deodorant.
7. Don’t drink the vente coffee and pint of juice before you go.
8. Don’t bring your life in a bag…the lockers are too small to fit it in.  Know what you need to bring and just bring that even if it makes you feel naked and unprepared.
9. Don’t let your 5 year old see where you’ve written ‘Don’t Panic’ in sharpie on your ankle.  You’ll have to explain and things could get tricky.
10. Don’t panic…unless you’ve parallel parked.

When I got out to the car I found I was pinned in and had to remember how to unparallel park.  I don’t think algebra got me out of that little mess…though, maybe it did.

x.

The angry elephant and the problem about learning in your sleep

‘Mama, what did it start out as? It looks like an angry elephant.’ – The 5yo

MMM…woke up this morning to the pleasant smell of skunk having slept through my alarm…again.  I wouldn’t mind so much except I changed it to ‘Breathe’ by the Prodigy because I could and I couldn’t think of anything more appropriately eye-opening.  Now I keep turning it off.  If I’m not careful and sleep too late, I am woken by the cat in my face roaring like a…cat.  Clever kitty.

I went to bed last night contemplating the cost effectiveness of treating mild gestational diabetes; and wondering if the increased risk of pre-eclampsia and gestational hypertension in pregnant women with mild gestational diabetes could mean that the mechanism of the disease in its mild form was different from that in its more severe…

I woke up late and, I swear, as dumb as a rock.

I listened to an NPR story the other week on learning in your sleep.  The program concluded that the only thing they’ve been able to prove is that a person is better able to retain information after they’ve had a chance to process it in their sleep, i.e. napping is good.  They also said that simple conditioning can happen in sleep under controlled circumstances.

I am not sure that I understood the articles that I read before bed but I am most certain that I didn’t understand them in the morning.  I dreamt I was on a roller-coaster.

Perhaps my cat is conditioning me to live more spontaneously.

Perhaps I am feeling like I did when I took my 8yo on the Boomerang at Elitches…wasn’t such a good idea.

I asked when I got to work about the whole gestational diabetes thing…turns I didn’t really have any idea after all, the mechanism of the disease is the same…there goes my doctorate thesis idea.

Nevermind.

I’ve been working on some digital ‘artwork’, you know…in my spare time.  (Who needs to get laundry done?)  The picture above apparently appears like an angry elephant.  Guess it depends on your perspective.  I am quite excited that the small boy figured that the picture had mutated from something else.  I am also quite excited that I surprised him when I showed him the original.  Guess I’m not dumb, boring mum after all.  Guess I should try to enjoy the roller-coaster and be grateful that I don’t smell skunk every morning.  Guess I should also probably change my alarm.

x.

 

Reflecting on the embers

‘Oh, I know how ridiculous you are.’ – Quote from my beautiful Katja (correctly noted and lovingly said).

When did it get to be September?

I once made a comment in a letter to a friend (I thought it was recently, but I am pretty sure that it was at least four years ago, maybe five) about the embers of the year.  I thought I was being very clever, but I am pretty sure that it’s been said before and I was just ripping it from beautifully talented poet.  I really should have said it more poetically here, just in case I was the first one to make it up but…yeah, I’m not feeling terribly poetic today.  AND I guess there is an ‘ober’ ending October and not an ember…

Maybe that’s why no one has said before that September begins the embers of the year.

I’m still left wondering where this year went.

A friend of mine is fond of telling me that life is like a roll of toilet paper.  In that the closer that it gets to the end of the roll, the faster it spins as you pull it off the tube.  (Personally, I’m not a big fan of putting the toilet paper on the little holder in the first place, as I feel I’m always replacing it.  So, why bother?)

My mind is racing this morning.

Apologies.

Perhaps I need coffee?

Right, so…the embers.  Poetic or accurate or not, it is coming to the end of the year.  (2012…wasn’t the world supposed to end this year?)  I just finished pulling August’s unfinished tasks onto September’s log of ‘to do’ and I’m once again overwhelmed.  I have another post about my little black book (which isn’t actually little) that I have been meaning to type up for some time.  I won’t spoil it, as it is on my ‘to do’ list and I will do it, but in order to recap and explain the little black book and the ‘to do’ list, I need to admit that it is never-ending.  I put things on the list sometimes just so that I can cross them off and feel some sort of satisfaction because the majority of things on it I have written over and over again, from month to month.  There are things on the list that have been on the list for years.  YEARS.  So I always get a little depressed when I have to transcribe it to another month and realize that I haven’t accomplished, yet again, what I intended to do.

Since the beginning of this whole ‘declare your five passions and work on only them so they grow,’ I have been consciously aware of not starting any new projects.  I won’t say I haven’t started anything new.  I have.  (I have also not finished any of these new things.)  But every time I find myself getting excited about something exciting and new I remember that I am not allowed (and this is my own limitation, not someone else’s.)  Then I get mad at myself and look at my list of ‘approved’ projects so that I can do SOMETHING creative and realize that I am bored with them and depressed and tired and never get anything done.  Then I exercise a bit and go to bed.

This is my life lately.

Not really something to blog about.

We recently had our appraisals at work.  Life is good and I enjoy my job.  I believe I have grown considerably this year.  My tasks are more clinical but I think I am also better able to switch between the front and the back.  I am (don’t laugh) more focused.  I have learned how to use the R2D2 ultrasound machine to locate fetal heartbeats and I am working on interpreting (unofficially) fetal monitoring strips.  I, undoubtedly, have more confidence and knowledge than I did last year…but I still didn’t finish a goal.

So I changed them.

Is this cheating?

They are in the same spirit of things, but are more concrete, measurable things that can be actually (hopefully) completed in a year.

Hopefully.

I have taken to heart the ADHD book recommendations…break tasks down into reasonable steps that can be completed.  So rather than ‘Nursing school?’, I have:

– (hang on, I have to look)…register for one pre-req at the local community college, save money for this class, find out what the pre-reqs are, contact an adviser for advice, continue personally driven education with one topic a month

They’re a bit backward.  I have no problem with starting from the ground up though.  I’ll update my ‘gaols’ now and try not to be depressed that it is almost time for end of the year festivals and a possible apocalypse.

My children have learned how to brew coffee.  I am very proud.  I am also very awake now.

I feel wrong not being at work on Monday.  It’s probably time to get something done…other than enjoying pretending that I am alternatively a goth chick with a chainsaw and a waitress on roller skates (also with a chainsaw) and hacking my way through the zombie horde.  I should be able to do something more productive.  Shoo the cat off the pile of papers I have to go through, figure out what I did with my brain (I woke it up with the coffee…then it wandered off) and try to work off the carbs from this morning’s breakfast (white chocolate lemon bread bought yesterday from the farmer’s market)…

Yum.

x.

Straight jacket of anxiety, meet the embracing of change

The very funny thing is we had been talking about listening, or trying to listen, to what was going on in a conversation.  ‘Nobody likes my jokes,’ my husband said at dinner the other day.  I can’t remember what his joke was about…(though I was listening.)  Our five year old replied in an attempt to make his dad feel better, ‘I like nachos.’

The world seemed slightly off center today…just a bit to the left, maybe, or tilted because the foundation had given way.

It was grey and wet after endless weeks and weeks of walking around in an aura of evaporated sweat.

It was silent after a weekend of hyperactivity and machine gun sound effects.  (This weekend hosted an epic battle between a green thunderbirds space shuttle, the cat in galactic space and the five year old’s unfortunately inherited inability to focus on anything, including behaving, for more than two minutes at a time.)

It was the beginning of a huge schedule shift for the family…shifting as it always seems to just when you get comfortable enough to have one hand on the wheel.

I’ve always noticed this kind of change most with the boys.  Get good at diapers and it’s time to potty train.  Get used to ‘I Can Read’ books and Go, Dog, Go! and they’ve moved onto Star Wars Clone Wars choose your own adventures.  ‘…there will be a whole new adventure waiting for you with every read.’  Get used to dropping them off at daycare and next thing they are packing lunches for school.

Today, it felt hard to breathe, as if someone was sitting on my chest.  Not in the fun way either, where there are tickle games but in the mean, ‘I’m going to make your face look funny,’ way.

Still, how often do you get to see change coming?

I would rather see the deer in the headlights stand in front of me on the road, than be hit by the train when I didn’t even know I was on the track.  Instead of waking up one morning and tripping over yourself when your son knows all the words to Baby got back.  Or while ‘following directions’ and getting completely lost and turned around in your old neighborhood (yes, it happened again) and ending up five miles out of your way before you have any idea where you are.

Change is good right?  I remind myself that the only constant thing in life is change.  If there were no change, a casual interest in Buffy the Vampire Slayer could not turn into my current love affair with Joss Whedon.  If there were no change, I would still be changing diapers and reading Go, Dog, Go!   ‘Hello again.  And now do you like my hat?’  If there were no change, I wouldn’t be debating the possibility that there are cats in intergalactic space with my children who never had any chance but to grow up with a bit of geek to go with their nerdy.

…just a few thoughts as I try not to hyperventilate.

‘I walk along these hillsides in the summer ‘neath the sunshine.
I am feathered by the moonlight falling down on me.’

(- A Murder of One, Counting Crows)

I welcome change…I think.

x.

Wash, the cat with the anxiety problem and a question about what to do

’15 seconds is a lifetime when you’ve already been doing pushups for 2 minutes and 45 seconds.’ – Observation.

I can’t do pushups for three minutes.  Or I suppose I – no, I won’t lie, it would come back to haunt me.  For all I know the fate of the universe rides on the ability to do 100 pushups in 3 minutes.  I am really hoping that the fate of the universe doesn’t come down to me and pushups…if it comes down to me, hopefully the fate of the universe will instead rely on –

(ok, I’m thinking here…)

my being able to reverse park (but only if no one is watching)?  Or knowing all the words to Eleanor Rigby (I think I know all the words)?  Or maybe knowing some really good quotes from The Princess Bride?  The ability to tie a knot in a cherry stem?

Yeah…sorry…that’s all I’ve got.

I’ve been stewing on this post for a while.  There is a lot going on in the life of undeadpollyanna…no more, I suppose than normal, but I’ll use the excuse any day.

The week started with a question that has been really, irritatingly, obnoxiously persistent:

When do you intervene?

When something is going wrong, when someone is hurting themselves or someone else, when you see something is going to happen and the consequences will be difficult?  When do you step in and make the bad guy drop his weapon?

‘Drop your sword’

I LOVE that movie!

I digress though.  I still want to know when you step in and DO something.  Not just as the president or a general or a celebrity or even as a medical professional.  When do you do something when you are a medical tech, a suburban mother, a wannabe writer, someone who cares enough to hold the door open for someone, and a plain old boring citizen?

I don’t know.

Before I go further, I will tell you a story…

We adopted a cat in January.  Her name is Aspen (it is the name she came with) and she has an anxiety problem…we get along.  As a family we are very hands off pet owners.  I feed the cat, I clean up her litter box, I throw the ball for her and stand as a scratching post when she has nothing else to do.  (She likes to stand behind me in the kitchen when I am ‘cooking’ and claw my calves.  When I turn around to see what she is doing, she also turns around and says, ‘meow’.  Then she runs off.  I don’t think she likes my cooking.)  I consider it a great honor when she comes to sit close to me or when she greets me at the door or when she wakes me up in the morning to play.  I love that she goes to sit outside the boys’ room as I read them a story and then sits with me as I sit in the hall to read while they fall asleep (so they don’t sneak down the stairs and see something they are not supposed to…they are very sneaky boys).  I don’t expect the cat to, but it is really nice that she does.

Oh, I should also mention that she is an inside cat.

This afternoon I cleaned out the area under my desk…I got rid of one box and two entire rubbish bags full of copies of drafts, notes, school papers and other things that I have no idea why I was holding on to.  I was very proud.  Aspen sat by me on the floor and wanted to inspect everything I threw away.  She curled up next to me and kept me warm and made my husband shake his head and say, ‘she likes you.’  As if he was surprised that anyone/thing could like me.

After I went for a bike ride and came home, ‘cooked’ and ate dinner…then I realized that I hadn’t seen Aspen for a while.  Usually, I look for her when she does this and I will see her reflective eyes staring at me from under the bed or on the bed or somewhere else as if to say, ‘You are disturbing me.’

This afternoon I looked in the usual places but I couldn’t find her.  When this happens, I usually open the door to a closet and she comes streaking out.  This afternoon, none of this happened.  I couldn’t find her.

I began to worry.

I casually went to look again…just in case I wasn’t paying attention the first time I looked.  I still didn’t find her.

Then my boys started looking and they didn’t find her.  They began to cry and say things like, ‘It is all my fault!’  So I am thinking that they have let her outside when they were playing…The rising panic that I was feeling was nothing compared to the pain they felt.  Never the less, I was proud that I was keeping it all together.  I ‘kept it together’ as I looked in more and more impossible places to see if I could find her.  I tore apart the boxes that I had put so carefully together under my desk, I went through the trash to make sure I hadn’t suffocated her in a Hefty bag.  I looked in the garage, under the car, in the cupboards, in the oven and the dishwasher…I still didn’t find her.  We destroyed all of the storage under the beds and in the closet creating a great big tornado like disaster area upstairs.

Finally, my husband, taking control, told me to get dressed and get my phone and the cat basket to be ready to come get her.  He was going out to look.

Meanwhile the 5 year old told me that she would have to come back to eat.  I told him that if she got out she would might have to hunt.  The 8 year old broke down (again) and asked through sobs, if she could hunt.  I assured him that she had instincts and ‘of course she could hunt’ but I wasn’t sure that I believed it myself.  I don’t know that much about cats and I was looking out on the nature preserve that backs onto the condo and I just wasn’t sure that we’d ever see her again.

My husband came around the corner and shaking his head said, ‘Well, good news, the guy with the rottweilers said his dogs didn’t eat her.’

Aaach!

I went back in the house and the next thing I know, Aspen is coming down the stairs.

I scared the life out of her (remember she has an anxiety problem) jumping up and down and trying to take her into my arms.  I am usually not very loud but the boys came inside, having heard me and we were all a happy family again.

Then I cried.

No one understood why but it was ok, because my cat was back.

So I have been struggling with this post for a while.  I either didn’t have time to write it or didn’t have any words to express my confusion and moral anguish over this question.  Then, the next thing I knew, I had another great example of another moral dilemma.  I told my friend that I had told my sister that I am trying to learn that there is a time and place for everything.  I cannot worry about being late or missing martial arts because of an inexplicable traffic jam, I cannot be angry or feel cheated because I did everything right and had everything running smoothly and on time to the point that we would have been early and my 8 year old didn’t have to have a stomach ache…I had to accept that it was ok.  That driving all the way to Safeway across town, because we were half way there already, to get British foods and run into the lady who told me (unbidden) that children grow up so fast was of such benefit that it was worth missing martial arts for.

In all honesty, I am not sure what my point is here.  I am slowly coming to a philosophic epiphany…but I can’t quite get there.  It is kind of like looking into the sun.

The original question was this:

I still don’t know (as a medical ‘professional’ or not) when you would stand up and speak up if you suspect that someone did the bait and switch on a urine drug screen.  Would it make a difference if you had hard evidence?  Would it make a difference if she was pregnant?  Would it make a difference if she had other kids at home?  Would it make a difference if it was your best friend?  Your sister?  Your daughter?   Would you personally take the children away?  Would you call social services?  Would you confront the bait and switcher because it might be a misunderstanding?  Would you instigate rumors so that someone did something about it?  Would you sit and do nothing?

I still don’t know (this is as a medical professional because I don’t think I have any sway in this at all) when you would be able  to decide that the well being of a baby who is not growing appropriately and risks perinatal asphyxia because of a malformed placenta and has intermittent absent or reverse doppler flow and non-reassuring NST…(I hear these things and have a vague understanding of their meaning)…Anyway, delivery is indicated by every medical opinion that I have come across so far, however, the mother won’t agree and flat refuses to do anything.  I keep hearing, ‘that baby is going to die.’  Will it?  I don’t know.  Maybe it would if it were delivered so early…maybe it will if no one does anything…maybe it is not anyone’s place to say anything except the mother of the child.

When do you push trying to get to martial arts when you now know you just won’t get there on time?  When do you start obsessing about a blog post because there are just too many ideas in your head?  When do you panic and cry and start mourning the cat when she’s upstairs all along?  When do you call social services?  When do you know how to stand up and make a fuss for what is right?

Would you consider testifying in court?  Would you risk your own family’s comfort or safety to make a difference?  (Curse you Hunger Games sequel for emphasizing my point and providing more readability!)  Would you stand and make a statement with violence if necessary?  If you aren’t already aware, they kill Wash…

When do you follow Shepard Book’s advice chanelled through Jane:

‘If you can’t do something smart, do something right.’?

I also LOVE that movie!  (Serenity for my non-nerd readers…check it out if you can…I would provide a link but the previous one wiped me out. (Sorry for the spoiler.))

Aspen is now sitting at my feet and it is well past time to put the boys to bed.  I am (now) enjoying my three day weekend with clean bathrooms and a re-organized under-desk…but I still want to know.

My husband is glad that the cat is back (even though he calls her fat and doesn’t understand her need to put her claws into his flesh).  He is, however, upset that he had to speak to the neighbors and walk further than to his car and back in order to find her for me.  I think with the excitement of the day, it may be worth going to bed…I might actually be able to sleep.

xoxo.

The beautiful crazy (I seriously have the shirt) and the absent tooth fariy

‘You need something that will burn fat…yoga doesn’t build muscle, push-ups and sit-ups do.’ – Quote from the husband yesterday morning.

That is how yesterday started…ergh!

Well, I didn’t know what to say, or I couldn’t say anything nice, so I didn’t say anything at all.  I do a lot of that (not saying).  Sometimes I forget to put the filter in and I say too much and the wrong things.  Even when I stop myself from saying what I think is the most witty remark, I often have to say it with the preface, ‘I almost said: [insert inappropriate phrase] but I didn’t because it would be inappropriate.’  Then I expect a little bone or cat niblet as I wag my tail as if everyone appreciates my excellent sarcasm.  I have to say most people aren’t impressed.  I am reminded of the ‘words of wisdom’ in the AD/HD book that I have mentioned before but can’t remember the name of and is up in the bathroom so I don’t want to get it, that this is something that people with AD/HD will often do.  They forget to put the filter in and can’t or don’t read the subtle signs of cultural context.  It may be true, I’m not sure.  It may be that I have just had the moon pointed out to me and need to constantly remind myself every time I look up that I’ve seen the moon.

I used to drive down the street and every time I saw a truck, even when I was all alone and I didn’t have the boys with me, say: ‘OOH! TRUCK!’  or ‘FIRE ENGINE!’ or ‘LOAD OF HAY, LOAD OF HAY, MAKE A WISH AND LOOK AWAY!’  The boys are a bit more sophisticated now, they want to know how to make a flying car or why the man with a sign on the corner is begging for money when he has enough to buy a mobile phone.

Sometimes I wish for those more simple days.

Yesterday was one of the craziest – these days every day is a beautiful crazy day I suppose, but yesterday it hit me and kept going, dragging me alongside the tracks of the proverbial runaway train.  The problem is that I am tired.  I don’t want to be and I don’t mean to be but I am tired.  I want to be full of energy and ready to face the beautiful crazy and not every minute expend effort and extreme concentration (of which, you know I lack) and determination.

My yoga practice was difficult in the morning.  I couldn’t ride as my husband was on call, so I picked a solar practice that was meant to be energizing.  I am fairly ashamed that I have videos as I can’t afford classes and I imagine it would be fairly embarrassing to me to do yoga in the park.  When I think about it I don’t see the yoginis, I just see the people standing around gawking and that is just not right.  So the practice was meant to be energizing but I found myself resting in prostration poses when my girl had moved on to more challenging asanas.  (I defy anyone to say yoga is easy…I’ll meet them at the flagpole after school.)

My 8 year old has been asking me to wake him up early lately.  I am not sure why other than he likes to get up, have the couch to himself and watch Transformers before everyone else starts yelling and telling him to blow his nose and get his shoes on.

I don’t blame him.  Perhaps he has heard me say too often that I am not sorry for getting up and riding or visiting the girl in my television who chants ‘om, shanti shanti’ and says ‘namaste’.

Anyway, I have been getting him up early and threatening that I will never do it again when he is as grumpy as anything come seven in the evening.  I got him up yesterday morning and went to take a shower.  When I got out my husband told me that he had a very loose tooth (the 8 year old, not my husband).  I flippantly asked if I could pull it out.

My husband asked, ‘would you let you do that?’

Fairly ashamed, I answered, ‘no.’

The rest of the morning crazy was not really crazy.  My 8 year old made his own breakfast and fed the cat.  I felt like I could actually take a breath and remember to brush the boy’s teeth like the nice dentist said I should…

Please, just skip forward if you know what comes next.  It’s easy enough to figure out.

The next thing I know he is jumping back and saying, ‘OW, MUM!’ and there is blood everywhere and his tooth is now stuck in the bristles of the brush I hold with no excuses and no good apologies in my hand.  I can’t tell you the words I thought, they are inappropriate.

You may think that this is not much of a problem.  I don’t know if everyone has stories of how their baby teeth were yanked out, I am not sure if mine are true or imagined or whether it is just a very traumatic thing to loose the teeth that you worked so hard and cried so hard to get into your mouth in the first place.

Except…

I had made such a big deal about how he HAD to lose the tooth at school.  How it would be a great thing to have to go down to the nurse’s and get a treasure chest and miss class and … he was really excited.  Said he had gotten one of those treasure chests with his first tooth but the tooth fairy stole it.

Oh…

Then, in the panic, and not thinking totally, I say ‘well, why don’t you take it to school and say you lost it there.’  My husband wasn’t impressed and made me apologize for teaching the child to lie.  I could have back pedaled except I had already voiced the elaborate plan to keep the tooth in a baggie in his pocket but take it out  before he showed it to the teacher, otherwise she would never believe he had just lost it.

I finished off before rushing off to the job I currently liken to covering myself in honey and walking into a beehive…sticky and a little bit yummy, that we would just have to let the tooth fairy know all about it tonight…

Meanwhile I am panicking about getting to his 3rd grade music performance, figuring out what we are going to do for dinner, hoping that his white shirt wasn’t inexplicably stained because I used the iron on it when it was still wet because I left it to the last minute to find it and found it in the white wash with all of the bloody handkerchiefs and dirty white socks…Worrying about whether or not I should let him go to a birthday party with a bunch of boys that I don’t know and who’s mums I don’t know and wondering if it is safe for him to play in the back ‘yard’…(see previous posts re mountain lions…)

The boy (my love) says, ‘It’s ok, mum.’

Oh, I thought my heart would break.  Then I survived the day and went to go watch him at his performance, glad to be standing in the back because I found myself in tears, the music is just so horribly beautiful.  I thought my heart would break again until I fell asleep on the couch and drempt about steping on fish and leading my cat around with a lead before a motorcycle scared it away and she went down a hole after a marmot…which I didn’t know the name of and couldn’t tell my 5 year old so he said he thought I was dumb…

Then…

Half way to work today, I realized that the tooth fairy had NOT visited our house last night.

I now stand ready for my mum of the year award.  I felt the same way when the same 8 year old told his martial arts teacher under pressure that he got five sheets of homework a night and didn’t have trouble turning them in when he actually gets five sheets a week plus reading and regularly has to do laps because he doesn’t turn them in even when he does them.  I felt the same way when my 5 year old told me I smelled like a dog, especially when I threw out the coodie catcher he read it from (Oh, I am so proud) for other such inappropriate phrases.

Luckily, I think she (the tooth fairy) might have been stuck in a meeting and should show up tonight with a mini lego set or a watch…I’m not sure.  Maybe she’ll leave a quarter, these are hard economic times, you know.

I will leave you with the following quotes (again, I am sorry that I am no good at references…no, I wasn’t ever a History student who relied on the proper referencing of materials to add legitimacy to her work…)

‘I believe celebrating mothers is a commemoration of extremes.  Not just because preeclampsia is an extreme condition, but because the mothers I am privileged to know represent the extremes that make up all mothers:  soft and tough, nurturing and driven, catalytic and comforting, impatient and optimistic.’ – From the Executive Director of the Preeclampsia Foundation (http://www.preeclampsia.org/)

‘You can’t do everything, you are not a superwoman.’ – Quote from a conversation I had yesterday…sorry, I wasn’t paying attention who said it to me.  I was too busy thinking, ‘Yeah!  You think?!  Well, I’ll show you, cos I’m just about to take on the world!  I’ve got the t-shirt and EVERYTHING!’

‘Well behaved women seldom make history.’ – Laurel Thatcher Ulrich

‘The cat and I have come to an understanding of mutual destruction.’ – Quote from the husband shortly before he likened me to Europe.

I’m getting a miniature of a girl in an evening gown carrying a shotgun so that she can shoot the zombies for mother’s day.  (Despite the fact that I am really a hippy about guns, I’m ok about a bit of glam fighting off the mindless hoard.)

Sweet dreams people, don’t dream about stepping on fish or marmot holes.

Also remember the tooth fairy may be experiencing a recession.  I’m relying on popular opinion to back up my assertions on the aforementioned delay.

xoxo.